Ultrawide 21:9 support in landscape and portrait

[RonnieBoy]

Hi Zen,

Could you please prioritize and look into implementing support for ultrawide 21:9 resolutions in landscape and portrait?

I finally got a rotatable arm for my 34" ultrawide for the sole purpose of playing pinball in portrait mode.

The Pinball Arcade works great.

Visual Pinball works great.

Pinball FX2 and FX3 unplayable due to cropped playfield which makes me supersad.

If you need a beta tester let me know I would be happy to offer my time to test it for you.

Here's my setup and how it looks with Pinball FX:

addams.jpg
joy1.jpgjoy2.jpg
zen1.jpg
zen2.jpg

[RonnieBoy]

I just tried it in rotated cabinet mode, not perfect but much better.

zen3.jpg

[Chili]

Hey Ronnieboy! Yes, it looks much better!

[RonnieBoy]

Hey Ronnieboy! Yes, it looks much better!

Which means that you are or are not going take a look at true ultrawide support?

[Chili]

Hey RonnieBoy! When we have any news regarding ultrawide support we will definitely let you know!

[RonnieBoy]

Hey RonnieBoy! When we have any news regarding ultrawide support we will definitely let you know!

Hah! You should get into politics.

[DCLXVI]

Maybe that topic is old, but do we any status on this ?

That would be great if we'd have view 8 to strech all the way when the screen is rotated in portrait mode and keeping the width.

Currently if Windows is in landscape mode, the view is cropped as above.
If Windows is in portrait mode, the view is stretched, but it seems Vert- instead of Hor+, which makes parts of the playfield out of view.

It's a bit sad that there is all the procedure where you need to send a picture of your setup wait for a code and... it doesn't work well if you have an ultrawide monitor.

[RonnieBoy]

Maybe that topic is old, but do we any status on this ?

That would be great if we'd have view 8 to strech all the way when the screen is rotated in portrait mode and keeping the width.

Currently if Windows is in landscape mode, the view is cropped as above.
If Windows is in portrait mode, the view is stretched, but it seems Vert- instead of Hor+, which makes parts of the playfield out of view.

It's a bit sad that there is all the procedure where you need to send a picture of your setup wait for a code and... it doesn't work well if you have an ultrawide monitor.

There is no news, when they have news they will definitly let us know!

[M!chel]

Not many people use a 21:9 monitor in portrait mode.
So, it doesn't have high priority.

[DCLXVI]

Not many people use a 21:9 monitor in portrait mode.
So, it doesn't have high priority.

That's right, there are not so many using 21:9 and even less using it in portrait mode. But that's not the point.

The problem here is that it doesn't work in landscape mode either.

And I was asking here because the game goes into doing stuff on purpose with the intent of preventing people to use portrait mode without the approval code, so when you have one... well it still doesn't work properly.

Here is what happens in cabinet mode:

Windows in Landscape mode:
- When screen rotation is 0°, game works as expected normally (Hor+), but that's not usefull, what's on the sides of the pinball does not really matter.
- When screen rotation is 90°, the game is now pillarboxed... it should stay Hor+ (related to original screen orientation), and not become aspect-ratio bound (more so that there is an interesting view 8 that would work well here, but you'd maybe need control of the orientation of the screen to make it look great, i.e. if you use the screen with a 45° angle on an arm).

Windows in Portrait mode:
- When screen rotation is 0°, then the game suddently becomes Ver- and you don't see enough on the sides to be able to play. Same goes for the menus.

So, ok, maybe portrait mode is not supported (weird if you consider pincab users, and considering there's an option to run the game in that orientation, but I do understand they want to make sure no one is doing shady stuff) but it should at least work in landscape and cabinet mode when you have a code.

Menus are already fine, so it's just a matter of making sure that when screen is rotated in cabinet mode, we stay Hor+ (or maybe we should say Ver+ as the screen is rotated ).

[M!chel]

As far as I can see FX3 is programmed to 16:9 format only. So, on a 21:9 it will either cut something off the image or give some black bars. (You show both examples in your pictures)
I do understand that this is an anoying issue for you, but this is just the way it is.
It probably isn't an easy thing to reprogram to game so that it can handle 21:9 format as well.

Cabinet mode is basically nothing more than enabling the option to use multiple screens.

[DCLXVI]

As far as I can see FX3 is programmed to 16:9 format only. So, on a 21:9 it will either cut something off the image or give some black bars. (You show both examples in your pictures)

Oh you're right, I was thinking it worked in 21:9 in regular mode but it does not !

It probably isn't an easy thing to reprogram to game so that it can handle 21:9 format as well.

You don't need to reprogram. It's just adapting the camera parameters (positions, FOV) and the tie the associated rendering frustum to the screen's aspect ratio.

Most likely less that an a week of work including testing for the person who's in charge of that area of engine code. There are so many engines doing that right nowadays that there are a lot of good examples out there.

But I do understand it's a niche, you have to have a 21:9 monitor, then you need to have a rotating arm.

However if they want to move to the mobile market they will have to do something at some point given there are so many aspect ratios with mobiles. I would see it as technical debt, but I guess they know better than I do


Addictive stuff they got with FX3 I have to admit, nice feeling with classical physics on Williams Fish Tales, different feel time with Sorcerer's lair but very satisfactoty... my wallet is itching when I see videos of other tables, I have to really reason myself that it's not working in 9:21 in order to prevent myself from buying all tables.

Yes, I think it's better if they don't fix it after all

That'll also prevent me from either buying or custom making a controller like RonnieBoy, it looks so cool.